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7 months ago

7 months ago

I like this deck! A mono-white Darien was actually the first good EDH deck I ever built, and on tapped out. Unfortunately i retired it due to my preference for a Mono-Red Goblin swarm as opposed to a Mono-White Soldier Swarm, though the latter definitely has goblins beat in the Lifegain department. So my deck on TappedOut is outdated but here

I would recommend Anointer Priest if you have interest in another ETB lifegainer, the more you have, the more threatening it is when your commander is out, and don't be afraid once your Commander is out to deal damage to yourself through certain affects such as Ankh of Mishra or, and I can't believe you didn't slide this in here but Blasting Station. With your commander and two 1-Life ETB cards, or your Healer of the Pride, you can give yourself Infinite Life.

Finally, for lands, Kabira Crossroads is a rarity and will gain you 2 life instead of the usual 1 that those kind of lands offer. Mistveil Plains is also nice if your opponent is dishing out alot of removal.

7 months ago

For starters, this looks like a fun deck to play. Swarming the board with tokens is always an exciting strategy. I find myself agreeing with ZendikariWol though about swapping commanders. This kind of deck would probably prefer a commander that costs less than 7 because that's a lot.

Also, your mana curve is rather high. Lowering it means you'll have more to play on earlier turns more often.

Teferi's Protection - token decks are weak to boardwipes. This phases you and all your permanents out of existence letting your token army dodge the removal. Obviously this is expensive, so I think it would depend on your meta

9 months ago

the mana curve does not look very healthy. You have a lot of overcosted things that don't actually do much and at the same time you don't have some pieces that I would say are almost mandatory in a darien build.

I know that you want to abuse Darien's ability, but stuff like Armageddon ClockMindstorm CrownJinxed IdolTorture ChamberAngel's TrumpetJade Monolith (Doom Cannon in the maybeboard) are absolutely garbage cards that do nothing when Darien is not on the field and that do very little work when he is in play. For example, you pay 6 for armageddon clock, than you have to wait 3 turns to have 6 soldiers, assuming that darien survives that long, and they are just 1/1s, maybe 2/2s or 3/3s at best.

Now, why don't you just Conqueror's Pledge for 5 mana and you have the 6 soldiers right away? Without even needing Darien out. I think that your deck should be able to generate a good amount of tokens without him and a CRAZY amount with him.You want only self-pain cards that provide other benefits, like Mana Vault or Mana Crypt if budget is not a problem, pain-lands are ok but you lack Ancient Tomb and City of Brass.

Then, I see that you go hard on the indestructible thing for protection, but

I think that you should use protection like Lightning Greaves and Mother of Runes for spot removal and Rootborn Defenses for mass removal if you really want to, but the best defense against removal is to have a deck that can actually recover using cards from your hand.

Then I see that you have a strong lifegain sub theme. Now, some things are efficient and mono white classics, like Soul Warden and Soul's Attendant, but you don't really want to have Healer of the Pride occupying a precious 4cmc slot orNoble Purpose in a 5cmc slot. Also, Anointer Priest is garbage because costs twice a soul sister but triggers only on your stuff and only on tokens, too situational.

Finally, classic anthems are bad. Very bad. Hall of TriumphIntangible VirtueGlorious AnthemHonor of the PurePhantom General these things are just trash. You need like AT LEAST 4 of these effects to have an army that can destroy the opponents and win the game. If you draw just a couple of them its just not enough and they are dead cards, if you draw too many there is a good chance that you didn't draw enough token generators and you have no soldiers.

I think that the good approach is to go directly from 1/1s to 20/20s. You do this by using exponential pumping, like Coat of ArmsMirror EntityJazal Goldmane and things like that. The benefits are that when you are ready you win out of nowhere and nobody sees you as a threat until then and also you don't use tons of card slots for minimal pumping. But, more importantly, dropping the +1/+1 effects opens you the option of using Skullclamp. The card is just bonkers and, ifyou can fuel it, you just win the game, assuming none destroys it on the spot. You also run Steelshaper's Gift, Enlightened Tutor and Open the Armory to find Skullclamp so that you virtually have 4 copies in the deck.

Ah, cut Caged Sun for Extraplanar Lens, its the only mana doubler worth considering in my experience, the other ones just die the turn you tap out to play them. And find room for Martial Coup that is both sweeper and token generator.

It may seem that I'm overly criticizing here, of course you can ignore some (if not all) of my advices if you are not convinced but I love Darien, I have played many of the bad things you are playing and eventually cut them out, just wish that someone told me these things so that I wouldn't have wasted time on bad cards. The cards may seem fun in theory but when you play and the deck doesn't work at all I guarantee that you feel only frustration and no fun.

9 months ago

Wow your list is basically what my list should be if I had the money for the more expensive stuff.

Just a few tips:

I think Jade Monolith is not very good. I cut it because it really does nothing. None will risk a combat phase if they see it on the field. I tried Blood of the Martyr and Sivvi's Valor that have the same effect but you can use them to surprise the opponents. In the end I cut them too, which brings me to the next point,

in my opinion going all-in on Darien ability is not a good choice, because he is very expensive and if they kill it once or twice then your whole deck stops working. I think you should have a few more ways to generate an amount of tokens that can kill. Of course you already have Elspeth, Decree of Justice and Martial Coup, I'd suggest also:

Finally, I think the mana doublers paint a target on your more than helping you. Either someone kills you or they get immediately blown up. I run only Extraplanar Lens because its cmc is low enough to do something else on the same turn I play it.

Ah, for the self-pain there is also Cold Snap, since you run snow lands. It's a bad card but I run it for flavor.

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